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How to Protect Content on Your WordPress Site

This post covers the SEO & marketing strategies around how you should protect content with WordPress.

A few days ago someone asked me a good question about SEO. When they have premium content is it best to de-index the page or to use a membership to control access?

I do have an SEO question. I've got a free 10-part marketing course. People sign up on the email list and the autoresponder sends them a lesson each week.

My means of protecting the content is to make each page an un-linked stand-alone page. But then Google can't search it.

And what's interesting to me about this question is that I did this exact thing with Lift Off Summit a few months ago. And I did it because it's free & easy:

I created a page

I de-indexed the page

I emailed all customers the link to the page

And… it did work. The pages are hidden so you have to purchase to get the links & even if someone shares the pages on social media they still won't be picked up in Google (because the page is de-indexed).

Missed Opportunities

But I realize that I missed out on an opportunity. Actually two opportunities.

Missing Free SEO

The first is an SEO component. Even though I didn't want people to share these hidden pages they did. And I missed out on that SEO benefit. The pages they linked were deindexed so it doesn't help my site.

I could rank a little higher if I let those pages were indexed. It's kind of like paying for something. Getting a few quarters of change and throwing them away. Why waste something that's free?

Missing an Upsell Opportunity

The second opportunity missed is a way to sell someone. Since people are sharing these links I could have used a membership system to conditionally display content. Ex.

If you purchased the content you should see the unlocked content.

If you didn't purchase the content you should see a teaser. Since my content is primarily videos it would be really easy to make a preview video to encourage the user to buy the content.

Conclusion

I'm disappointed by the missed marketing opportunities. Some membership plugins are free and the one I really like (WooCommerce Memberships) is only $150. For $150 I bet I could upsell another customer or two and have the plugin pay for itself.

So you can make the same mistake I did and de-index pages or you can find a membership plugin, have a nicer user experience, make a bit more money, and not have to worry about SEO issues.